Los Angeles Rams defense coordinator Raheem Morris enjoyed an emotional reunion with a doctor and the little boy they saved from drowning in a Las Vegas resort pool last month.
Morris, 46, was vacationing with his family at the Encore Hotel when a three-year-old named Wyatt Stanley was suddenly pulled out of the water.
“I sit down and my kids are all screaming, I see Wyatt lying by the pool and he’s blue,” Morris told ABC’s Good Morning America. “I just wanted to help and I could feel all the panic. And I looked at the lifeguard and I said, “Where’s the AED?”
Morris learned about automated external defibrillators after he and his Rams teammates underwent emergency training following Damar Hamlin’s on-pitch cardiac arrest in January. The Buffalo Bills’ safety was revived by medical personnel from the team performing CPR and AEDs, and Hamlin has spent the following months raising awareness of this life-saving training.
It was this education that helped save Wyatt’s life.
Morris had an emotional reunion with a doctor and the little boy on ABC’s GMA
Raheem Morris (left) and Dr. Andrew Oleksyn (right) is credited with saving Wyatt’s life
Wyatt’s long-term prognosis remains unclear due to the time he spent underwater
“It’s really a miracle trying to process everything that’s happened in my head,” Wyatt’s mother Kelseigh told GMA.
She and her husband Joe described the terrifying moment when their older child introduced them to Wyatt.
“I was sitting in the chair and my 7-year-old runs up to me and says, ‘Wyatt, Wyatt, he’s underwater,'” Joe Stanley said. “And I went and got him, there was no heartbeat, no pulse.” When I picked him up, he was face down and nose to the pool. I realized he was limp.’
Andrew Oleksyn, an Illinois-based doctor, was also at the pool and getting active.
“I ran over and when I spoke to Wyatt, as an ER doctor, I knew he was in trouble,” Oleksyn said. “I immediately started chest compressions, examined the child and took a pulse.” At this point, the child had no pulse.’
At that point, Morris came back with the AED machine that was nearby. Between Oleksyn’s compressions, he quickly applied the AED, and within moments Wyatt’s pulse was returning.
“When he said, ‘He has a pulse,’ I started clapping,” Morris said.
Wyatt, 3, is pictured with his father Joe and mother Kelseigh in a GMA segment
dr Andrew Oleksyn is pictured holding three-year-old Wyatt a month after she nearly drowned
The pool at Encore Las Vegas is pictured in 2014 when the venue hosted the Stanley Cup
Wyatt was hospitalized shortly thereafter and as seen in footage with Morris appears to be doing better, although the long-term prognosis remains unclear.
“It’s hard to say exactly what his future will be because he’s been underwater for so long,” Kelseigh said.
The smiling three-year-old actually hugged former Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coaches and Oleksyn, both of whom Wyatt’s mom called “miracles,” during that segment.
“At that point I got emotional because it was like you saved not only Wyatt but also his family,” Oleksyn said.
“We’re really so happy that Raheem was there and Dr. Andrew was there,” Kelseigh said. “God put them all right where they needed to be.”
Morris is one of many NFL insiders who received CPR/AED and first aid training on the field in Cincinnati following Hamlin’s cardiac arrest.
Not only did Hamlin survive, but he also plans to return to the NFL in 2023 after suffering cardiac arrest resulting from an episode of commotio cordis resulting from a blow to the chest.
Morris helped save the life of a drowning child in a pool at a Las Vegas resort last month, and now he’s praising the first-aid training following Damar Hamlin’s collapse
Well-wishers poured $10 million into online fundraisers, which he donated to his charity, Chasing M’s Foundation, which focuses on supporting CPR and AED training, among other things.
The NFL has embraced the cause as well, and several teams are training to get their employees certified in CPR and AEDs.
In addition to Hamlin’s cardiac arrest, Morris previously told ESPN that the drowning of Bucs linebacker Shaquil Barrett’s two-year-old daughter in April helped further raise his awareness and preparedness. Morris, who is not directly quoted on the subject in the ESPN article, left the Buccaneers in 2011, seven seasons before Barrett joined the team.
Arrayah Barrett reportedly fell into the family pool on an April morning, leading to the tragedy.